TORONTO (Reuters) – Canadian Industry Minister François-Philippe Champagne spoke with Alimentation Couche-Tard founder Alain Bouchard and assured him he would support Canadian business after the company gave up plans to buy European retailer Carrefour SA, the minister said in a tweet on Sunday.
Quebec convenience store operator Couche-Tard has dropped talks to buy Carrefour for $ 20 billion after French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire expressed concern about food security and the place of business. the work. Instead, the two companies decided to work on partnership opportunities, they said in a joint statement on Saturday.
Champagne said in his tweet that the government will support Canadian businesses “here and abroad”, adding that two-way trade benefits businesses on both sides of the Atlantic.
Bouchard, a self-made billionaire, took Couche-Tard from a single store in 1980 to a global network of stores and gas stations with a market value of $ 33 billion, with 66 purchases along the way.
France’s swift and firm rejection of the deal sparked an explosion of a transatlantic lobby to save the deal, but the companies ended their pursuit late on Friday. Le Maire reiterated his opposition without listening to the terms of the transaction, sources told Reuters on Friday and said that any such agreement should not be revised before the 2022 French presidential election.
Reporting by Denny Thomas; Edited by Lisa Shumaker